The Primal Hunter

A labyrinth was a labyrinth, no big way to really change that. Minaga hadn’t tried either, as they once more found themselves walking through winding hallways of mist, following after Jake, who had a nice mental map in his head. The difference this time around was that there was a ”correct” way right off the bat, with no rooms or anything to look for.

Instead, they just had to pass through a pretty big labyrinth to reach a gate at the end, but based on how long it would take to reach the gate, this could not be the entire floor. They also had at least three rooms to clear with difficulty ratings attached. The only challenge on this floor so far was the occasional trap, which they could have some fun with. Some of these traps were placed even on the fastest path to the finish and were quite varied.

Some were good-old spike traps, some released mana bolts from the walls, and a few even summoned enemies they had to fight. The fights and traps were all made quite a lot harder to deal with due to the mist, but they still easily managed and moved forward quickly – or as quickly as one could with the mist limiting their movement speed.

”This is quite familiar to what we have done before,” the Sword Saint voiced his thoughts.

”Ree!” Sylphie complained as she flew alongside them.

”Yeah, pretty damn similar, but we will reach the gate in just a bit, so maybe something will change then,” Jake shrugged as they did indeed soon reach the first gate. It had taken them nearly two-and-a-half hours to get there due to the traps while taking the fastest route, so he guessed this floor would be quite a pain for parties without what was essentially maphack.

A few minutes later, they turned the final corner and saw the gate before them. This gate was quite a bit different from those prior, and on the other side of it, Jake just saw an empty void of nothingness. On both sides of the gate itself were two large runes for four total that all lit up. Jake scanned them and quickly got the gist of it.

1. Puzzle (Easy)

2. Combat (Medium)

3. Crafting (Easy)

4. Random (Easy)

”We get to choose the challenge room type and the difficulty,” Jake noted as he looked over the four options.

”Not much choice when one considers the bonus objective,”the Fallen King said.

”True,” Jake nodded. ”Now, how do we pick…”

It took minimal figuring out before they discovered that three of them just had to infuse energy or touch one of the marks at once. They naturally activated the second option to do a little combat.

Once they activated it, the entire gate began to glow, and as Jake released another pulse, he saw a massive room appear on the other side. It extended even beyond his Pulse of Perception, meaning it had to be at least three-hundred kilometers long. He could see that it had a width of around two hundred kilometers, though.

When the gate opened, they walked through the usual fog gate, and Jake felt the pleasant wind hit him. They were in a mountainous environment, and when Jake looked ahead, he saw a pterodactyl-looking creature flying through the air. He naturally used Identify, and it had a quite disappointing level.

[Windborne Shrieker – lvl 239]

Moreover, he did not feel like it was a strong variant at all. Jake also quickly saw a whole lot of dinosaurs wandering around in the deep valleys below, and as he was still trying to figure out where all the enemies were, they got a system message.

Room Objective: Clear the room to unlock the teleporter.

841/841 enemies remaining.

”That seems simple,” Dina nodded.

”Yeah, I am surprised there is not some twist… I just think we have to kill everything here,” Jake nodded.

”It does seem as such… thus, we should get started immediately,” the Fallen King said as he reached out his hand towards the Shrieker Jake had Identified earlier. It abruptly stopped in mid-air many kilometers away as the King squeezed his clawed hand. The Shrieker struggled as the King lifted his other hand and made a tearing motion. In the distance, a wing was ripped off the creature as it continued to struggle, with the Fallen King’s hands finally glowing golden as he crushed them together; the Shrieker in the distance also getting crushed as it fell broken to the ground.

840/841 enemies remaining.

”City floor wasn’t entirely a waste of time, now was it?” Jake smirked as he also pulled out his bow.

improvements do not make up for time wasted,”the Fallen King

”Considering we have to kill everything here… I guess finding all of

the Sword Saint

made sure to note it as he activated Mark of the Avaricious Arcane Hunter, hundreds of marks placed within less than a second. With his high Perception, marking this

the location of every single marked target with the party as Dina looked at him. ”Are you sure about all

”Yep,” Jake smiled.

nodded as she took out her staff and slammed it into the ground as a pulse of nature mana was released. Jake just shook his head and

Yet before any of these had time to do much, death arrived from below as dinosaurs in the valleys down in the valleys felt the environment itself turn against them as Dina’s attack arrived and did quite

814/841 enemies remaining.

estimated the entire place was around four-hundred kilometers in length. That meant his Pulse soon allowed him to scan it all. Once he had marked all the dinosaurs present, Jake set up shop as he summoned a platform of arcane mana beneath himself. It was as sturdy

towards him, wind, rain, vines, and explosions of force magic tearing up the land. Within long, they were done slaughtering the far too-easy room, with Jake finishing off the last few dinosaurs while the rest of the party made it over to where Jake

Room completed. Teleporter activated.

they quickly got the teleporter that had been towards the far end of the room inside of a cave filled

Highest difficulty

more appeared at the start of a labyrinth with three paths to

make our way through another labyrinth before the next challenge room?” the King

Jake answered after sending out a Pulse of Perception. ”But this one

the Sword

gave them time to

they were once more met

1. Puzzle (Medium)

2. Collection (Medium)

3. Combat (Easy)

4. Random (Easy)

Both the Puzzle and the Collection one were of equal difficulty based on what Jake could see, though he did want to make

when several options have the same difficulty rating, can we just pick ourselves?” Jake decided to ask

want to also add that I am not actually deciding which ones get the high difficulties here. I made it all pseudo-random to make every experience slightly different. Ah, for reference, you will be able to find this kind of floor with the same design even in other grades. It is quite popular if I say so

that must have been hard. Almost like it

say they were pseudo-random, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have a backdoor where I can decide to make every single

a shred of fear. ”I do not believe your integrity and professionalism will allow you to have water

be crossed, and that threat was in poor taste. From the bottom of my

do that,” Jake smiled. ”Thanks for

know we reached an understanding. Enjoy the

turning to the party. ”We should pick the Collection one. My gut is telling me that will be incredibly easy

”Oh, come on!”

too late. They had all activated the Collection room, and the door opened to reveal another large, albeit slightly smaller room than the last. This environment looked like a large underground cave, but luckily there were no mushrooms anywhere. There was plenty of moss, though, and it grew

Objective: Collect all the

32/32 Hidden Tokens remaining.

throughout the large cave. These tokens were all hidden inside natural formations, below the ground or inside walls, with

asked the moss to lend a hand later, and they

difficulty

increases,” the Sword Saint said as they began walking through yet another labyrinth. ”After the Demon Lord, this

the arena

for the variance to hold meaning, there has to be an element of challenge to the variance. If not, it is simply going through the motions,” the Fallen King joined

difficulty, and if this floor didn’t start easy, it wouldn’t have space to get harder later on. We are pretty good at these

to have!” Minaga swooped

so you do like it when we speedrun the floors and cheese them?” Jake shot back

off as fast as he